Disk layout planning is still a good idea. The trick is making sure your applications respect your plans.

You can find many definitions and concepts about entrepreneurs and most involve innovation. In a formal way, you’ll see textbooks saying that they recognize opportunities and then orchestrate the people and resources to turn the advantage of an opportunity into a successful business venture.

Then you see additions to the descriptions that says an entrepreneur assumes the financial risk and management of going after the opportunity. I wouldn’t classify this group as entrepreneurs. Instead, I call them financial risk takers.

People who know have designated me an entrepreneur on a few occasions. I saw unexploited market niches and went after them. The first involved writing a microprocessor based accounting system for CPAs that allowed even sole proprietors to cut costs and do the work of ten staff members. That caught fire and had a nice exit strategy.

Others included automating the financial planning industry with a computerized system. Then we have the building of a Linux/UNIX clone of Outlook for Microsoft Exchange. In the course of events I learned to refine the process of orchestration and grow a second skin. I haven’t ventured out again since 2002 after three hostile takeovers.

My experience generally and in Entrepreneurs Anonymous says that if you orchestrate a niche and taking it to the next level involves the need for capital. The guys with the money typically kill the original entrepreneur. First they reduce the entrepreneur’s holdings and finally figure a way to push them out of the business usually through false accusations, litigation and withholding of promised rewards.

A Niche for the Brave Hearted

I consider myself a free software proponent. In my weltanschauung I also see the software in devices as something that manufacturers should open. But, they don’t.

An irony exists for the vocal free software crowd. It sits in their use of proprietary hardware to host their free software operating systems. Again, in my world view it’s like the irony of Ireland’s copying the government structure of the nation she most hated - incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs.

In my last article, I wrote about my commercial DVD player failing. As an update to that, I purchased a much smaller and more capable RCA in China brand replacement for $39. Feature wise it beat up my previous RCA box that cost multiples of $39. The new box took up 20 percent of the space of the previous one.

The new DVD player supports a multitude of proprietary formats including music and video we like in the free software world. That intrigued me. While I fiddled with it, I learned that it had an embedded OS and components that cost me more at my favorite computer stores or on-line. In other words, I couldn’t build that DVD player for $39 from off-the-shelf parts.

Going back to size, while compact, it also contained space. I would have designed the RCA in China DVD player differently and only used the platter and placed the components below it. But I can see why the manufacturer did not do that. Next to it on the same shelf, I saw a portable DVD player selling for $120 more and that was the cheap one.

That gave me the idea for a new business involving the use of an embedded OS and a set of proprietary audio and video formats. If free software advocates can live with Intel and VIA chip-sets, why couldn’t they live with multimedia on a chip?

The Changing World of Media

Recently, my wife made an astute observation about recorded music. She started off by discussing her vinyl record collection, then her cassette tapes (she missed the 8 track phase), then her CDs and now digital music. She found it somewhat funny that people invest in smaller and smaller delivery devices.

I wonder if Popsicle could increase the sales of its products by putting an iPod or other device in the center of their Fudsicle or Big Stick Cherry Pineapple Swirl. They could sell their Good Humor brand with a Blue Tooth enabled ear piece.

Anyone Interested?

As a kid, I coveted my grand dad’s McIntosh MA 230 Tube Preamp / Amplifier. I remember it had 60 watts RMS with 30 coming out of each side. Of course, it needed a huge piece of furniture to hold it and his Acoustic Research model AR XA turntable. I loved it. But, it came from his day.

Not too long ago, I found a 500 watt RMS preamp/amp that I picked up with my index finger and thumb that sold for $30. I just needed to add a volume control and a couple of other items to hook it up to my Cambridge speakers. Talk about irony.

Laugh as you will, hit this article with your vitriolic comments, etc. I get more validation from George Gershwin’s “They All Laughed”. I’m pretty sure you don’t know the song, since it comes from days before most of your grand parents grew up. It’s about that second skin I mentioned.

I see the opportunity for a work-around for the things Linux and FreeBSD need to compete with the Mac OS X and Windows desktops. If an entrepreneur(s) exists out there, consider music on a chip for free software platforms. It’s probably a money maker but you’ll need a little money to make it happen.

As a Linux advocate or should we say a bigot, I recently correlated enough of a survey to recognize that the Linux community has not arrived fully. Of course, if you want to discuss the issue of arriving, you also have to define the destination. I have a reference for meeting the goal and that came from Linus Torvald’s speech in March 1999 in San Jose when he uttered the words “world domination”.

Then, I also have my own itinerary. At one time, I felt angry toward and betrayed by Microsoft. So, during the Justice Department’s anti-trust suit, I had hope that the Redmond gang would meet with a break up. Someone dashed my hopes after George Bush’s assumption of office in 2001. That’s a little off topic.

I created an itinerary where Microsoft fell under the weight of Linux and free software. I envisioned the major vendors working together to hurt the giant of Redmond. And why not, I reasoned that free software mostly dumped on the users of the world by the National Science Foundation would see massive adoption.

But, let’s forget my itinerary and Linus’ world domination statement and look into the world of enterprises. Hey, guess what, Linux and free software haven’t made it. Not much demand for Linux people exists. Speaking with a bevy of recruiting firms convinced me. Here’s a few bullet points:

• Rarely do recruiters see job orders for Linux administrators. Those that do see a few live in the top tier.
• Demand for Linux admins seems concentrated in the ISP/Hosting market where Linux has about a 60% of the business.
• Advertisements for Linux skills on job boards and classified listings tend to say “Linux experience a plus”.

You didn’t read anything so far saying that Linux is losing, failing and not gaining any ground, etc. Linux has captured some technology markets. Unfortunately for the rah-rah crowd, Linux has not made much progress at capturing desktop market share. Where Linux has an advantage has not produced technology to benefit the desktop. In other words, the advances in Linux benefit servers and embedded devices and not the desktop.

I once proposed that someone create a DVD player with a daughter board. I thought that one could create an embedded device to accompany a DVD Rom using Cyberlink’s products to allow Linux desktops to play DVDs and other proprietary formats. I even thought about a PCI card that had the Cyberlink products on it. That’s not a stretch.

I also suggested that one of the major Linux vendors start a distribution and license Cyberlink’s audio and video products. That distributor could sell a stand alone version of the software as an add-on in different formats. People could buy that components alone. That would put Linux on even footing with other desktop operating systems.

So far, we have no takers.

I have concluded that Linux cannot expect to remain 100% free software and gain market share on the desktop. People will want features not available as free. That begins and ends with the current rave in music and video. We can give that fight up to the money people.

Last night, my DVD player failed. I own a RCA box that attaches to my Hitachi Television. In the middle of the story, the DVD player just started making ugly pictures and skipped tracks. Having no other choice, I booted up the computer my wife uses at home with the same OS she uses at her job. I finished watching the DVD on an Intel computer with an Apple Studio Display running XP.

I would have liked to have used my Linux desktop. But alas, I live in the US and we don’t get to use the Win32 codecs or the DeCSS DVD-decryption tools. We’re video and audio challenged.

I wonder. If Linux could perform the functions available on the Windows desktop, then would we start seeing jobs for Linux skilled technicians? I think so. Instead of just desk side support for Windows, companies would need to support people for Linux too. That would cause some growth.

In the mean time, I have given up my disdain for Microsoft. That’s right, I don’t feel strongly about them one way or the other. They’re just there and I will deal with them when I do.

As far as Linux and the demand for Linux system administrators, the US job market sees it in the server area but not on the desktop. At least, not yet.

Would you buy a computer that you had no intention of using?